Book I. Dialogue IX: On perfect love of God, which does not exclude the hope of reward

I

Q. What is that love of God which is called disinterested and the love of pure benevolence ?

A. It is that with which we love God for himself alone, without hope of return.

Q. What is interested love ?

A. It is the love of Christian hope, by which we love God in relation to ourselves, as our sovereign good and of necessity our sovereign beatitude.

Q. What was the error of the false mystics on this point ?

A. They erred in admitting pure love only in a certain state of the so-called perfect: whereas it exists even in the state of the beginners, for no man can be just without having in a certain degree true justice, which consists in loving God for himself because he merits it, and with a sovereign love, that is a love greater than any other, because God is above all.

(f. But if this love is common to all, what difference will there be between the just and the perfect ?

A. The difference is that the latter love God more perfectly, but with the same love of pure benevolence, for there are no two kinds of this love.

Q. But in what does the perfection of this love consist ?

A. It consists, says Bossuet, in a more continuous, more habitual, more dominant, exercise of the same charity which is common to all.¹

Q. What difference is there, then, between love and pure love ?

A. None except in degree, for all love of charity is so essentially disinterested that there is no love which is not disinterested, according to S. Paul’s words: Charity seeketh not her own, Caritas non quaerit quae sua sunt.

Q. What, on this point, was the false disinterestedness of the new mystics ?

A. Their error was to believe in a disinterestedness carried to an extreme and exclusive of every other motive than that of loving God for himself alone.

Q. Is not that very perfect ?

A. It is too perfect; may one not sin by excess, as much as by default ?

II

Q. In what does this excess consist?

A. Not in the love of God, for in that there can be no excess; not in loving him for himself alone; but in loving him in such a way as to exclude other motives for loving him that the Scriptures and the Fathers set before us incessantly, such as the benefits and the eternal recompense he promises.

Q. What evil results from this exclusion ?

A. That on the pretext of a completely disinterested love Christian hope is banished, contrary to the words of S. Paul: ‘ And now there remain Faith, Hope and Charity, these three; Manent tria haec.’ For if our so-called perfect ones no longer wish to think of eternal recompense, the formal motive of hope, which is our beatitude, no longer exists for them, and consequently they destroy the exercise of the second theological virtue, which is hope.

Q. What other evil result has this exclusion ?

A. It is in formal opposition to the Council of Trent, 1 which decided that all the just and even the * Cone. Trid., Sess. V, Ch. XI.

most perfect, regard eternal recompense as a means not only and principally of glorifying God, but also of combatting their negligence and of encouraging them to run their course. Now if they thought no longer of this recompense, it would no longer be for them a motive capable of animating them and rousing their courage.²³⁴

Q. But perhaps the perfect no longer need to think of recompense.

A. It is to preclude this vain pretension that the same Council supported its decision with the example of David, who said: c I inclined my heart to do thy justifications for ever, for the reward 5; and of Moses, of whom the Apostle said: ‘ For he looked unto the reward 5 in order to show that even among the greatest saints there is during this life a foundation of sloth which must be aroused by the sight of eternal recompense; and that to neglect this aid, or in a word to refrain from using it habitually, is to give oneself up to vanity, and to ignore human weakness and the temptations to which we are exposed in the course of our pilgrimage. 2

HaAVHd NO supposes the love we have for him because of his perfections and his infinite lovableness, without which charity itself would no longer exist, bereft of its principal object, which is the excellence of the divine nature.

Q. Now pure love is established in its essential and specific object, as the School puts it. But perhaps in recognizing these acts of pure love, he did not recognize that they can be achieved both easily and often.

A. Not at all; for whoever recognizes the acts of any virtue must of necessity see that they can be repeated often, and that by their frequent repetition one may acquire the facility of producing them.

‘Z ■ Perhaps he condemns the state of pure love.

A. He condemns the state which excludes other motives of loving God, but not that which does not exclude them; as he explains in the preface to his second treatise. It is concerned with a passage of Silvius,⁵ who, explaining in his book on the Venerable Bede the three degrees of Slave, Hireling and Son, said that it is in the last when one is wholly a Son, that one has no thought of recompense: tantum est filius nullum omnino respectum habeas ad mercedem. From which it follows, says Bossuet, (i) that he whom one calls only a son, with no thought of recompense, is so only in abstraction (that is, by the force of his love, which usually prevents him from thinking of rewards), without being so by exclusion, that is by rejecting, scorning, or forgetting altogether this reward, which is a promised good and one for which we ought to hope; (ii) that this abstraction neither should nor can be perpetual, because we should think of this reward and we often need to do so; now, since the quality of c Son 5 represents the ordinary state of pure love, this is what Bossuet admits and what rejects in it: (i) he admits in it pure love by abstraction from the other motives of loving, but never by their deliberate exclusion; ( ii) he declares that this abstraction caused by the vehemence of love neither should nor can be perpetual, partly on account of the virtue of hope, which should be practised in every state, partly because of our frequent need for re-animation and encouragement; for this need (he adds) will never cease.

Q. Whenever we desire this recompense do we withdraw from pure love ?

A. Not at all, the Bishop of Meaux tells us, provided we desire it above all because God wishes it, as finding in it the height of his glory and the most perfect manifestation of his greatness; for this is an act of pure and perfectly disinterested love, in which we do not relate God to ourselves, but ourselves wholly to God and to his glory; henceforth we love him more than ourselves, for we love ourselves only in him and for him.

Ill

Q. In what then does he say consists the perfection of love and of its disinterestedness ?

A. Not, he says, in suppressing the motive of hope, or in forgetting recompense; but on the contrary in desiring this divine reward, having regard rather to God’s will and his great glory than to our own interest and happiness; in holding ourselves always in movement, relating our beatitude unceasingly to the glory of God. This, he tells us, is what we must learn to cut out from our hearts; aiming at our last end in view of the eternal reward, instead of getting it in the good pleasure of God, and in his glory above.⁶

Q. I understand that every act which thus relates our beatitude to God is an act of charity, but what then becomes of hope ?

A. This single act embraces both, by the double motive that exists in it; the recompense which we desire as being promised produces hope in God; this recompense, desired more for the glory of God than to beatify ourselves, produces purity of love. This is what Bossuet calls hope which is absorbed in love, or love which perfects hope by making it as disinterested as possible without destroying it. This, he says, is the best thing we have to sacrifice; it is the love of the recompense which inspires the children of God with Christian hope> not by destroying it but by urging it higher, relating it to charity, which happens when we love this recompense chiefly for God and in relation to him.

Q. How comes it, then, that instead of being taught to love the recompense in God and for God, we are told that it is better in general not to think of recompense, so that we may act in regard to God alone ?

A. Because the first is much easier, and serves as a step to mount to the high degree of disinterestedness of which the Bishop of Meaux speaks.

Q. Explain how the one can be easier than the other.

A. This is because it costs much less to our self-love to become sufficiently disinterested to relate to God alone our small services, abstracting from recompenses, than to relate to him those recompenses themselves and love them principally for his sake in the pleasing sight of those recompenses. A lesser degree of love would suffice for the first kind of disinterestedness; but for the second, which means our desiring glory and eternal happiness less for our own pleasure than for the greater glory of God, what a strong love is necessary ! What continual efforts in regard to oneself! That is why Bossuet just told us that we must keep always in movement relating our beatitude unceasingly to the glory of God. But by frequently relating our works to him alone, we gradually learn to be so disinterested for love of him that we finally attain to being ordinarily in the heroic disposition of never reposing our heart wholly in eternal beatitude, but passing beyond that, as Sylvius says, by loving it chiefly for the glory of God, who alone is the last end of everything.⁷

IV

Q. Could you not summarize in a few words the doctrine of Bossuet on the practice of perfect love ?

A. He has almost done it himself in two propositions.

• Second treatise. Preface, § 92.

94 ONPRAYER

The first is: though God, who is good in himself, is the proper object of charity, 1 this notion does not exclude but actually rather affirms that of a beneficent God who loves men, because being beneficent in this way is a goodness in God, and a perfection worthy of love. The love God bears us is, so to speak, a special loveability in him, as S. Thomas, S. Bonaventure, Duns Scotus, Suarez, and all the scholastics unanimously teach. It is on account of this special loveability that the Beloved Disciple told us we must love God because he first loved us. The mystics are of the same mind, Bossuet continues, as witness Ruysbroeck and Harphius, who give as chief motive for the purest love, to love that love which loves us eternally, amorem aeternaliter nos amantem; to love, as they say, the abysmal love, abyssalem amorem, that is, in their language, intimate, deep, infinite love, which in God is nothing else than God himself. The second proposition, which is merely a consequence of the first, 2 is this: In practice there arise two sorts of motive for love however pure: one is the excellence of the divine nature; the other assumes this, and adds that this perfect and excellent nature loves us eternally, wherefore it creates us, redeems us and makes us happy; from which it follows that the whole object of the purest love itself is God, who is excellent in himself, and infinitely communicative and benevolent. It is thus in practice, without refining too much on the distinction of the objects and motives of love, that one loves those who are outstanding in the exercise of pure and divine love; Moses, David, S. Paul, and in short of the greatest saints.

d- What does he conclude from this ?

A. To separate the two ideas of God as sovereignly good in himself, and as infinitely communicative of his goodness, otherwise than by abstraction is a doctrine contrary to piety, to the whole of theology and the

Holy Scriptures. From which it will be seen that Bossuet admits pure love by abstraction from interested motives, and that he declares further that this love may subsist with acts of Christian hope, provided this hope is related to God as the last end of all things.⁸

Q. Why should this doctrine, which separates otherwise than by abstraction the two ideas of which he speaks, be contrary to piety, to theology, etc. ?

A. If we separate the two motives for loving God, regarding the second as interested and unworthy to enter into the true charity of the perfect, we fall into the indifference of the new mystics regarding salvation and the virtues; in which matter they try in vain to stand on the authority of S. Francis de Sales and certain other spirituals, as the Bishop of Meaux will now shew us.

Footnotes

1. Preface on the Instruction Pastorale of F^nelon, § 96. ↩

2. S. Augustine here makes an impossible supposition: If God came in person, and said to you with his own lips: Sin as much as you like; be content; let all that you love be given you; let all that is opposed to your plans perish, let none contradict you; let nobody reprove or blame you; let all the wealth you desire be given you in profusion; live thus enjoy- ably, not for a time but for ever—the only condition is that you will never see my face. My brethren, whence comes that groan I hear among you at these words, if it is not that that chaste fear, which goes on from generation to generation, has already been born in you ? Why are your hearts stricken within you at these words: you will never see my face ? Ah ! the soul touched with chaste fear could not hold back its tears, and would say: Oh ! may I lose all the rest if I may only see thy face 1 The soul would cry (he continues): Turn us, O God of hosts, and show us thy face. See how ardent is this chaste fear, this veritable and sincere love.’ S. Augustine gives it all these names to show how pure it is, and yet it is the love of a God, who by discovering himself to us, will bring about our happiness. ↩

3. Hugh of S. Victor replies as follows to these false mystics: Hear these wise men (these mystics); they say: 1 We love God; but we do not desire him.’ It is as if they said: ‘ We love him, but are not concerned with him.’ I am a man and would not ’ST § C4 *sg.tireg sop SGniix'Bj[ soq „ ‘gsixggix puooog x *9aoj ou GAGq ppiOAi no^C 9JiS9p ou p^q noA ji jo^ *9AO{ jnOiC jo ^ogfqo oqx si QjiSGp no^C ^T3qM puG ‘Suiqx -9mos 9.IIS9P c^9iC no;£ ‘qaoj no.‘uiiq (jnq Suiqjou 9JiS9p noiC ^nq < pGjsQJ9jiiisip xou si qaoj jnoiC ‘uiiq soptsoq sBuiqx joqjo GJiSGp no.‘jj *gaoj snoxitijGjS g qxjAi raiq Suiaoj si ‘gsig xqSnGU puG ‘guoi'B uiiq Suijisgq i unq ssossod ox GJisop qoti si xj ji po£) jo gaoj G qX si ^-oqAv joj i ^ij^qo jo gjtixgu Ajga Gqx jo ^ubjouHi gjg Ava\ siqx ut qGGds oqAi osoqx * * * 1 po£) jo ^CqxJOAi 9q pjnoo tiosbgj qXjA\ xogCgj ^iqGuosBGj xqSiui ugui g x^qx qaoj g ji U9qx oSpnp *GAO| ano^ joj Suiqxou qaiS ppioAv j ‘gui qxiAV. jjosjno^ Suiiijgouod xnoqxiAi gui poAoj noA jt: Qoud siqx x^ no^ Aq pGAoj oq ox Qqq -dMf fyxvssdOdu ‘ (ssout<f<fvy xno fo ooxnos dip sv ‘si pyi) pofqo Suirffiivoq v sv poQ o; xvdq ocn ipiyon oaoj oyi pyi ‘ouipnfiny •q uioxf 7/27 fo porn puv sxopop <Cjoy oyi moxf ‘soxuicfixog dip moxf cnoys 01 fpsmiy ps oycn ‘xnvop\f fo (foysiq oyi pu ‘rndip pomopnoov svy oycn pq: opnipvoq puv poxopi xioy1 xof {quo poQ yoos 0 / pomopnoov diuoodq oavy suvipixyj pyi pws si ij : jpsuiiq x'e x^qM- -3Uios pauire U39q 3A^q ox paSptqf aq uop^snooB uv ox A\ddJ siq Aq paouiAuoo 3 joui U3A3 aq qiM no/^ •y l }I JO SS3DX3 ot spafqo A\uo 3q 3Duis c;qSnoqT s^m sb qao{ 3jnd o; posoddo os }ou si uaq^ xnB3j[ jo doqsig; oqj^ f) •miy Suiaoj xof daijom luvuocfiui ssoj puv puoods v jnq si slip ifinoipp ( poQ Smao[ xof sdapom lUdSoo pom dip fo ouo fo dovpf dip doipvxtf ui wdip sdaiS ji mdip fimpnpxd moxf xvf os i poQ fo sifouoq xoyp dip puv dpnjpvdq oy; fo si iQixvip sup piopuocfopui xdaocnoy jvyj f Xdipo dip f (Qiuvipixyj fo uoipof -xdj oyi sd\nipsuoo ipiycn o;vp xvpupxvcj v 01 Suopq;ou sdop p 'jvip (Cpudnhosuoo puv pnf oyi pv ui spixd ivy; (Cpxvip dip fo uoipufop v si siyi pyi: suopipuoo ocn; uo inq •uotfn pooxSv (Cpsvd si C ivdcfdx 1 ‘(Cpxvyo fo uopiufdp siyi f miy ui punof dq 01 dpnipvdq oyi fo iCpuopuocfopui fjosmiy xof poQ fo oaoj v si iCpxvyj pip poyog oyi fo iCpxofvm oyi ypcn pooxfiv si ij : ojvxopvj uoipnxpuj siq joy v uoos SMoqoj qoxqM T 3sp^3JT puoods siq ui stqj sui^jdxo aq srnaa; x^q^A ur j^aq f aqods xsrqf 9M qoiqM JO SS3Up3XS3J3XUISip 3Sp?J pU^ J0JJ3 3qX Apj3]AI Y ↩

4. suuiapuoo XTTB3J^ jo doqsiq aq;;i3qx Apo^xa ji si x^qM C 3 A 0 | 3Jnd SutuaaouoD suopsonb asoqx \e uj -f) ↩

5. Second treatise, Preface, § 94. ↩

6. Second treatise. Preface, § 93. ↩

7. Fifth treatise on the il ‘oximes, § 10. See also Summa Doctrines, § 8. ■ Fifth treatise, § 11. ↩

8. We can reduce to five truths, says Bossuet, the rules or maxims which establish the motives of divine love. (i) Perfect love has for motive the greatest perfection and the highest excellence. (ii) It is an excellence in God to be good, liberal, benevolent, communicative, loving those who love him, telling them of his love and overwhelming them with gifts when they respond to it, even to the extent of giving them himself. (iii) It is God’s place alone to love without necessity; our essential need attaches and subjects us to him as to one who makes us happy in giving us himself, apart from whom we can find nothing but trouble and unhappiness. (iv) Nothing can remove from the heart the desiro to be happy; and if we could master ourselves and cease to be con- cerned with ourselves, then we should no longer be subject to God, who could make us neither happy nor unhappy, could neither reward nor punish us, except perhaps by annihilating us; which again would be uncertain, supposing that we could be indifferent to that fate. (v) Essential beatitude is nothing but the consummation or perfection of charity; the sight of God makes it the purest and most perfect love that could exist, by making it unchanging; the love itself is a part of the possession. Thus to say that the desire to possess God prevents the purity and perfection of love, is to say that it is prevented by the desire to attain to unchanging and perfect love. These five truths are evident to reason, indubitable to faith, incontestable in the School. There is no author to be found who has ever called them in question, and all that is opposed to them is worthy of condemnation. (Fifth treatise of Bossuet, ad fin.) ↩